Vehicle Repair and Maintenance

Welcome to the landing page for all thing vehicular and shop related. Any videos or information related to vehicles and things to work on vehicles can be found in the pages and their corresponding videos below. Just click on a page to see the related video(s), product links and any supplementary information.

Cut to the chase, old man. Take me to the videos!

Wait, tell me some more…

For most of us, our vehicles are the second most expensive things in our lives and right behind housing in terms of our monthly expenses. Like it or not, If you live in America and outside of a major city, you will typically need a vehicle

Most repair shops charge well in excess of $100 per hour to fix your car. There are valid and good reasons for these rates but that’s not really the point here. The point here is that unless your free time is worth way more than $100 an hour, you might want to do as much of your own work as possible.

Doing It Yourself (aka DIY) has a lot of advantages. There is a sense of accomplishment and pride in a job well done. You can impress your friends and neighbors with your skills; although this will often lead to them wanting you to be their mechanic! While you will definitely save money, some of that money will need to be used to purchase tools. Eventually you will have enough tools and experience to be pretty damn useful. If you’re a man; other men will look up to you and if you are a woman; you will be viewed as closer to a goddess than a mortal.

One of the other advantages of doing it yourself includes more time to make sure it’s done right. Many shops are less than reputable or fair and will take shortcuts when doing work that will greatly shorten the length of time between repairs. Some times its the shop, sometimes its the mechanic, and sometimes its the manager demanding work be done in the least amount of time possible. Take for example, brake caliper pins. These pins are what the brake caliper “floats” on and allow it to center itself relative to the rotor. I have seen the aftermath of many “professional” brake jobs where the shop neglects to clean or lubricate these pins. As a result the caliper wears out the brakes on one side only in less then half the miles it should and when you go back; the shop will get you for another “brake job” plus tell you that happened because your caliper is bad but they can fix it for another $500 plus $300 for another brake job. FFS, even if you just learn what it takes to do it right and you watch their work; you can make sure it’s done right and will be a more informed consumer.

The old Roman expression of Caveat Emptor means “Let the Buyer be Ware”. I have literally seen a shop tell someone they wanted over $500.00 to change a light bulb!!!! Unless you educate yourself, you are at high risk of being fooled and ripped off.

Not that all mechanics or shops are bad people, but without some idea of what it takes; how would you know? Unless you live in a state that does not have vehicle safety inspections and you have your own tire changer, balancer and alignment set-up (probably about $15,000.00 worth of equipment); you will need to deal with a local mechanic.

I have dealt with my garage for inspections and tires for well over ten years now and consider them to be friends of mine. Even if you do relatively insane things for a shade tree mechanic like rebuild transmissions, you will need to deal with a garage. Look online at reviews, ask friends who they use, and stop by to see the operation before you choose your mechanic. Keep in mind that shops advertising $40.00 brake jobs are not giving you good quality brakes, are not changing the rotors, are not lubing the caliper pins and are, in all likely-hood, using that $40.00 to go fishing and see if they can get you to spend $400.00 or more.

Back to the main point, doing it right costs money, doing it right yourself costs a lot less money. Hell even if you know what’s involved in a job, that will give you ammunition to negotiate price or an understanding of why the price is what it is.

Here We Go:

Individual Repair Videos

YouTube Shorts

Shade Tree Mechanic Bas